Halo: Ghosts of Onyx (12 page)

Kurt nodded. This had cost the AI a high price, so he would do his best to listen.

"Also, let us not waste time debating the nuances of this Slipstream-space COM probe. That is classified, and you don't have clearance."

"Then what are we talking about?" Kurt asked.

"I have found three anomalies to the current bioaugmentation protocols." Deep Winter clapped his handed together and two gyrating collections of steel spheres appeared. "These represent the protein complexes miso-olanzapine and cyclodexione-4," Deep Winter explained, "which were secreted into the alteration regime."

Kurt leaned closer to the spinning molecules.

"They are antipsychotic and bipolar integration drugs," Deep Winter said.

He clapped his hands and a third molecule appeared: twisting silver and gold blobs. "And this," the AI said, "is a mutagen that alters key regions in a subject's frontal lobe."

Deep Winter faded to semitranslucency. "It enhances aggression, making the animal part of the mind more accessible in times of stress. Someone so mutated has reserves of strength and endurance no normal human could call upon. Such a person could also continue to fight under the influence of wide systemic shock that would instantly kill a normal human.

"The mutagen, however, depresses the higher reason centers of the brain over time," the AI continued. "The antipsychotic drugs and bipolar integration medicines counter this effect. As

long as the SPARTAN-IIIs have these agents in their system, they compensate."

Kurt understood all of this. Under extreme stress the coun-teragents would metabolize quickly, and the primitive brain would take over. His Spartans would fight and be harder to kill. The effect was only reversed by the counteragents. It was dangerous. His Spartans could lose the ability to reason. It might give them the edge needed to survive, though.

Deep Winter continued to fade. The AI had always placed the Spartan candidates' wellbeing over their training or any agenda Section Three had for them.

"You care for them in your own way," Kurt said. "The Spartans."

"Of course I do. They are just children, regardless of what has been done to them. You must halt the protocol. Brain mutations were specifically outlawed by UNSC MED COPRS in 2513. The moral argument algorithms are robust."

Deep Winter shrank to a single tiny snowflake glimmer on the desk. "I am a fifth-generation smart AI, Kurt. I have reached the end of my effective operational life on Onyx. By the time you return, I will have been shut down and replaced. I have left files."

The snowflake glistened, its tips melting. Deep Winter whispered, "You must proceed cautiously; I am unsure who in ONI has masterminded this illegal procedure, but they will surely attempt to cover it up."

The snowflake melted, and with it all holographic traces of Deep Winter vanished. The surface of the black COM sphere heated, the surface bubbled, and thin ribbons of smoke curled from within.

Yes, they would cover it up. When Kurt returned to Onyx he would inform Colonel Ackerson… and then they would arrange to have all of Deep Winter's files purged.

The mutation had been Kurt's idea. He had had to persuade the Colonel to allow it, and they had even kept it a secret from

the others in the SPARTAN-III subsection cell to preserve their "plausible deniability."

Kurt had seen too many of his Spartans die; he would have broken a hundred regs and bioethical policies to give his people the slightest chance to survive one more battle.

His only regret was not being able to do more.

Deep Winter's "instinct" to save the Spartans was misguided. None of them could be protected that way. Warriors fought battles; they prevailed, but all inevitably faced death. Even his children candidates understood that.

They did not, however, have to die so easily.

Kurt turned from the COM probe, and left the Admiral's office.

He had to go congratulate Gamma Company… and welcome them into the brotherhood of Spartans.

SECTION II
I INTRUDERS

CHAPTER

TWELVE
0645 HOURS, OCTOBER 31, 2552 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ZETA DORADUS SYSTEM, NEAR ZONE 67, PLANET ONYX

Two flash-bang grenades detonated—balls of lightning and thunder and fluttering leaves.

Ash fell and reflexively curled into a ball. He'd seen the steel hexagonal tubes a split second too late, and then their images had been burned into his retinas.

They'd been too well camouflaged, chest level in the trees. Stupid. He wasn't thinking, letting his blood rise and get the best of him.

He uncurled and rolled to his feet. They only thing he heard was his hammering heart;

otherwise he was deaf.

Ash blinked to clear his blurred vision.

Team Saber was down. Mark, Olivia, Holly, and Dante were on their knees. Their SPI armor camouflage buffers had been wiped by the flash-bangs, and only the faintest beige camo patterns were beginning to resolve like bruises. The new photo-reactive coating technology could mimic a wide range of EM radiation, but it was still sensitive to overload.

He pulled Mark to his feet, shook him.

Mark nodded and then got the others up.

Ash motioned them back, reversing the direction they had walked into this trap. They

only had a moment before Team Katana moved in for the kill.

This was his fault. He'd been too eager, too easily pushed into action without thinking. Mark had spotted a sniper from Katana,

and Ash had too quickly decided to flank to the left… and walked straight into the
real
trap, the flash-bangs.

But that was the point of this exercise, wasn't it? Compress three Spartan squads into a

square kilometer arena—think fast or die.

Or worse, in this case, think fast or
lose.

Ash held up a hand, halting his team. They would not fall straight back. If he were Team

Katana he'd have set up another trap for a retreating enemy. He motioned for them to hook right.

Team Saber moved in a crouch through the brush, slow, careful, eyes wide. Olivia took point, and she vanished into the green shadows.

Ringing started in Ash's ears. That was a good sign. Another half meter closer to those grenades and he'd have lost the eardrum. In situ cloning was an excruciatingly boring procedure, and he'd be happy to avoid the two-week mandatory downtime.

A red status light winked from Olivia. The team froze.

Five meters ahead, a fern bent and sprang back.

Ash rapidly blinked his green status light: the signal to open fire. This was the best target they'd had all morning.

Suppressed gunfire surrounded him. The fern exploded into a shower of confetti.

A single Spartan hidden by the fern turned, their SPI armor flashing silver from the staccato of stun rounds that peppered its surface. Their foot caught on a root and they tumbled.

Ash repeated the go-ahead signal, and his squad made sure the target
stayed
down with several bursts of well-placed rounds. The ballistic gel underlayer of their armor could take a heck of a pounding before breaking down.

After three seconds, he flashed red, and they ceased fire.

Olivia moved up and slapped a lime-green sticky flag on the still-writhing Spartan's back. The target was now officially "dead."

Ash activated a NAV marker and alerted C and C for pickup of the "corpse."

The ground trembled, just for a moment, but all the Spartans in Team Saber froze, and then scanned the jungle, looking for the source of the disturbance.

Earthquake? Not likely. There was no tectonic activity on Onyx. That left only two possibilities: impact or detonation. Neither was especially welcome.

Ash motioned for Saber to move out. They slinked through the jungle and emerged on a plain. Here small limestone granite and quartz mesas, grottos, and fissures extended to the north— up to and beyond the high fence of Zone 67.

The Zone was where the "ghost" of Onyx was supposed to be. It'd been spotted once or twice according to other Spartan candidates: a single eye in the dark. They just made up that stuff to scare plebes. Ash had, however, heard of a Beta Company squad that had vanished near here and never been found.

He looked around warily and spotted a naturally eroded tunnel that extended through a hill. Ash pointed and Team Saber settled inside to assess the tactical situation.

Ash pulled off his helmet, and wiped the blood from his nose and hair. "Too close," he said.

"Still, we got one," Holly said, pulling off her own golden mirrored helmet, "and we didn't lose one of ours… although
you
sure gave it a good try." She scratched the fuzz on her head, which she had buzz-cut into a series of bear-claw scratch patterns. The length was a-okay by the regs, but some of the other teams teased her about it. Holly got a little wild about the teasing, and she had been demoted twice for fighting.

Dante removed his helmet and felt his scarred face for any damage. Satisfied, he retrieved two black flash-bang grenades from his pack. "Found these, just before yours went off. Caught the trip wires."

Ash nodded. He should have reprimanded Dante for sticking

his hands near a set of primed grenades. Then again, Dante had near-magical abilities when it came to explosives. He always knew when they were about to go, and when they wouldn't. That or he was the luckiest person he'd ever seen.

Olivia kept her SPI helmet on. She slipped out of the cave, taking up a guard position outside. Ash wasn't worried. She was the best sneak in Gamma Company. They called her "O" for short because she was as whisper-quiet as her vowel namesake.

Ash turned to Mark. "Head check," he said, and patted his friend on the back of his helmet.

Mark pulled the helmet off, and Ash saw a nasty bruise on his cheek. Mark ran his hands over his shaved head and worried the edges of that bruise.

"I'm fine," Mark said. He smoothed the inner lining of his armor, making sure it was perfect, and then slipped the helmet back on.

They called Mark
"The
Mark," because he was their best marksman—good with a sniper rifle, but better with a rifle on full auto in all-out target-rich free-for-all. The more pressure on him, the cooler he got.

Ash spotted bands of rough onyx along the tunnel wall, black and white and streaked with flecks of gold. He ran a gloved finger over the patterns, intrigued by the geological oddity.

He then snapped out of it and focused on the here and now. He slipped his helmet back on.

"Audio check," Ash whispered over TEAMCOM.

Green status lights winked back. Good. No one was deaf.

A dull thump echoed off the distant mesa walls, and dust rained down from the cave ceiling.

Team Saber instinctively dropped to a crouch. Ash pulled his sidearm.

"Big one," Dante muttered. "Artillery? One of the new four-forties?"

"I don't think the Lieutenant Commander would use artillery on us," Ash whispered.

"Not normally," Holly replied. "But this is the
last
test. Maybe he's pulling out all the stops to figure out who'll get top honors."

Top honors. Ash had pushed Team Saber to stay on top for the last three years: honing their specialties; learning every lesson Endless Summer threw at them; and thinking, moving, and acting together as a single razor-edged weapon. Only two other teams were even close in the rankings. Gladius and Katana. Top honors would mean bragging rights and respect. It would mean they were the best. That they'd won.

Over TEAMCOM, Ash said, "O, you get a direction on that blast?"

Olivia's status light winked red.

"Okay," Ash said, "we'll assume it's artillery for now. I can't believe the Lieutenant

Commander would be using it… but Mendez is another story. You hear incoming, scatter, and take cover."

Four green LEDs lit on his heads-up display, acknowledging the order.

Ash had read somewhere that you never heard the artillery shell that killed you. He had no desire to personally test that battlefield legend.

"What's the plan for Katana and Gladius?" Mark asked.

"Katana's down one," Ash replied. "We'll focus on the weaker of the two. We'll find—"

Another thump and the ground shuddered.

"Closer," Olivia whispered over TEAMCOM. "Vector north."

Ash stepped out of the tunnel and took cover by a large boulder. The others followed and their SPI armor blended into the rocky terrain.

If this was another trap, then they were probably stepping

out right into a sniper's line of fire. But Ash didn't think so. No one would use ordnance that big so close, not even Mendez.

An explosion like that wasn't something you could throw together from rocks and branches and a couple of flash-bang grenades, either… so that eliminated Teams Katana and Gladius.

So who
was
doing it?

Forty meters to the north v/as the triple fence surrounding Zone 67. Electrified razor wire, motion sensors, and lanes of minefields made an effective barrier. If pressed, Team Saber could have gotten around it—but they wouldn't. The LC's orders had been crystal clear: DO NOT CROSS. It would count as an instant disqualification for top honors.

What about the other teams? Just a quick hop over and lateral move to flank him? No. None of them would risk a disqualification.

There was a dust storm about three kilometers into Zone 67, a wall of sand, swirling smoke… and fire.

A distant mesa exploded—vaporized into a mushroom of glittering quartz dust, a hail of boulders, and roiling flame.

Ash instinctively ducked, and his insides clenched.

He'd seen big explosions before. Nothing like that, though
. "Two kilometers," Dante said. "Felt that one in my bones." They watched the stones rain from the sky. "A few Archer missiles maybe…" Mark murmured. Dots swirled about the edge of the expanding cloud of dust. If Ash didn't know better he'd

have sworn they were vultures. But Onyx didn't have raptorlike avian species. Ash zoomed magnification on his faceplate. At five-times he saw the dots had a three

fold symmetry.

He unslung his sniper rifle and sited through the scope.

They were drones of some sort. But not UNSC MAKOS. Not Covenant Banshees fliers,

either. They were a few meters long.

Three dull steel booms that surrounded a centra! eye, glowing like molten iron. No obvious jets. No cockpit. There were a dozen of them.

"Has to be an experimental prototype," Dante said. Maybe Zone 67 is a testing range for new weapons."

"They wouldn't be 'testing' a megaton worth of destructive force while we were so close," Ash countered.

Or
was
this part of the final test? Some new threat that the three squads would have to band together to defeat? That would be Chief Mendez's style: change the rules in the middle of a test.

The drones moved away from the atomized mesa, drifted closer to Team Saber's location, stopping short just on the opposite side of the Zone 67 fence, where they circled another butte.

Ash spied motion atop that formation. Shutters from a a camouflaged bunker popped open, and heavy machine-gun fire strafed the drones.

The lead drone's three booms snapped forward to make a triangular flat plane. A

glimmering film of gold popped into place and fifty-caliber rounds impacted and bounced off.

"Energy shields!" Dante said. "Has to be Covenant."

Ash reluctantly agreed with this assessment. This was no game, no final honors test.

The war had arrived on Onyx.

He broadcast over an open COM channel: "Currahee C and C, come in. This is Saber

One. We have an emergency."

No answer. His radio light was green. He
was
broadcasting, but no one was listening.

"Radio check," Ash said to his team. "Everyone try to get the Lieutenant Commander or

the Chief. Try to raise the
Agincourt,
too." Ash used his sniper rifle and tracked the drones.

The remaining eleven lined up behind the one distorted to form an energy shield; their red eyes aligned and pointed directly at the mesa top. Men emerged from the bunker with M19 missile launchers. The drones' eyes flared to a brilliant gold—energy projected forward, flicking like a rapier

strike.

The men and bunker wavered a moment, erupted into flames, and vaporized. The mesa top then detonated into a cloud of dust and molten rock.

The ground tilted and cracked. Team Saber retreated into the tunnel and debris rained

over them.

Ash squinted back through the haze.

The drones had scattered and moved forward, zigzagging over the rocky terrain: a

search pattern.

He moved to the opposite end of the tunnel and risked another open COM broadcast. "Team Katana, Team Gladius, Covenant activity in Zone 67. Forget the test, guys. We've got a situation."

CHAPTER

THIRTEE
N

0700 HOURS, OCTOBER 31, 2552 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ZETA DORADUS SYSTEM, NEAR CAMP CURRAHEE, PLANET ONYX

Kurt scanned the horizon with his binoculars. He watched the pattern of the wind in the tree line, the birds that had taken wing, and a whisper of smoke that snaked up from the canopy.

There was trouble in the air.

From his perch in the "tree house" he couldn't see the source of the disturbance near the Spartan test area.

The tree house was a platform a hundred meters off the jungle floor in the titan arms of a banyan tree. The only electronics here were the radio and the AI projection unit. Everything else was low-tech: optic binoculars and telescopes, parabolic sound collection dishes, good old-fashioned signal flags.

"What's the
Agincourt
got?" he asked Mendez.